2012 Picture of the Year: A pair of European Bee-eaters in Ariège, France.

Dear Wikimedians,

Wikimedia Commons is happy to announce that the 2013 Picture of the Year competition is now open. This year will be the eighth edition of the annual Wikimedia Commons photo competition, which recognizes exceptional contributions by users on Wikimedia Commons. Wikimedia users are invited to vote for their favorite images featured on Commons during the last year (2013) to produce a single Picture of the Year.

Hundreds of images that have been rated Featured Pictures by the international Wikimedia Commons community in the past year are all entered in this competition. These images include professional animal and plant shots, breathtaking panoramas and skylines, restorations of historical images, photographs portraying the world's best architecture, impressive human portraits, and so much more.

For your convenience, we have sorted the images into topical categories. Two rounds of voting will be held: In the first round, you may vote for as many images as you like. The top 30 overall and the most popular image in each category will continue to the final. In the final round, you may vote for just one image to become the Picture of the Year.

Dear Morning Sunshine, I am writing to inform you that you are in danger of losing your adminship on Commons because of inactivity.

If you want to keep your adminship, you need both to sign at Commons:Administrators/Inactivity section/Feb-Mar 2015 within 30 days of today's date, and also to make at least five further admin actions in the following six months. Anyone who does not do so will automatically lose administrator rights.